


a thin line - the horizon

by Arzani



Category: Black Sails
Genre: 4x10, F/M, Hurt, M/M, Multi, a lot of John just thinking and missing and staring at the horizon, reaction fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-02
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-10-14 03:25:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10527846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arzani/pseuds/Arzani
Summary: Peace was a fragile thing and his sanity secured by the belief that James was happy. Because he had Thomas back. It had to be. Any other thought would destroy him completely.Reaction fic to 4.10. What goes through Silver's head when he looks out at the horizon on Maroon Island.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not over the final episode. This is just me and a reaction fic. I will never stop believed they loved each other. Rip it of my dead hands.
> 
> Not betaed, forgive me.

It was a thin line which separated the ocean from the sky. A thin, vulnerable line, called the horizon. A storm played it easily, blurred it with ease, broke and diminished it. But today was not such a day. Today was sunny and the horizon was clearly visible.

_“Can’t you see it?”_

His gaze lingered. Salt-drenched air tousled his locks, tied back in a ponytail. The last time he had let them free was weeks back. Months. Was it even a year? He had to blink away his tears when he remembered green eyes, framed by too many freckles.

It was the only thing he ever saw these days.

Peace was a fragile thing and his sanity secured by the belief that James was happy. Because he had Thomas back. It had to be. Any other thought would destroy him completely.

To go with him into that estate had been an impossibility. He had left Hands and Benn Gunn to do the job, to secure the safety of James, to hand over the money to secure it. Enough money to secure he would never be treated badly. Both him and Thomas. For what was worth, John knew James needed Thomas to live. A low, bitter chuckle slipped his throat. They probably had broken out from there the second day of James’ stay. It was an incredulous thing to know Thomas had been in there for years. A part of him wanted them to have broken out. A part of him clung to the soothing it put on his pain.

Nothing of it was in his hands anymore. Fate decided on its own where to go. John knew he had always been a doll, nothing more and nothing less. His stories were unworthy to tell, when the world was such a bigger place.

_“Let me tell you a story about a man named Vanquez.”_

It sounded heavy, promising. Vanquez was a name that made people perk up. Captain Flint was a name that made people perk up. John Silver was not and a “Long” before the name didn’t add to it.

“I always loved you.”

It was a mere mumble. A slip of words, taken by the wind and carried out to the ocean. Unworthy of mention, like a tear compared to the width of the sea. Yet it felt heavy when it rolled down John’s cheek. His whole life had shifted due to it. Sadness was all that remained. A hole unable to be filled.

_The world with its unending horrors._

Could he go back to those horrors, reexperience them again and undo his past? See James one more time, pretend to be a shitty cook and… and what? Where had been the point to change things? When had been that moment in need of change to secure their mutual happiness?

John knew James had loved him. The moment Dooley had fallen, John had realized James had acted out of love all the time. It was why he had known to be successful forcing James into a life in exile. But it had needed Madi’s refusal, her dismissal, to remind him he had gained absolutely nothing out of it.

Jack had told him James needed to die. A story for a story. It was nothing John had been able to allow. With the little power he had still in his hands, he had tried to make the best of it. The best for James.

Why had no one told him it hurt so much to rip his own heart out?

Another tear trickled down his cheeks, over his chin until it dropped on his breeches. James had warned him that no story would make Madi forgive him. Could he not have pointed out that the truth would not make her forgive him, too?

God, he missed him so much! It was a part of him that would always remain missing. Something that died with Captain Flint. There was no place in James McGraws’ life for John Silver. Never had. Never would be.

His head had dropped, but his gaze was drawn to the thin line that was the horizon, again. Where the sea met the sky. Where they embraced each other, but would never suffice to touch.

_“When there is no daylight between you and I…”_

The night was over. Dawn had banished it. He should let go. Live for the next day. But all he wished was for James to walk up this hill, two swords in his hand, smiling. “Again!”

They had never been closer than the moment their two blades clashed.

“John!”

Heat rushed through his veins and for a sparse moment he believed the voice to be a deep rumble. Realization dawned too quickly on him, though, and John knew it wasn’t. The thunder that was his beating heart turned into a butterfly-like. His head turned slowly and a small smile tugged at the edges of his mouth. It was a fragile smile, filled with countless emotions. But it was a start.

Reaching for his crutch he lifted himself off of his spot and left the memories behind. They were old. As old as his own story and there would be another day to dwell on them. Everyday was a day to dwell on them.

“Madi…,” he mumbled, loud enough for her to hear, but still only above a whisper. His heart clenched. The urge to rush to her pulled at him, but the last time they had spoken she had told him to leave and he wouldn’t test his luck. If there was any left.

Silence stretched on and on and on. The wind buzzed in his ears, loud and unforgiving. For the first time in a long while John could feel a pain where his leg used to be. A phantom, a ghost, nothing that was real. Still it ached.

When Madi spoke, she clearly chocked on her tears. But her head was held high and she looked beautiful. Beautiful, strong and regal. Everything John wasn’t.

“Tell me you regret it.”

The wind pulled at his clothes, at his hair and wanted to drag him off. If he only could let it. Topple him into the ocean and let him drown and drown and drown. But James wouldn’t want it. Wouldn’t let it happen. Would probably jump right after him and drag him out. So he gulped around the lump in his throat and answered.

“As I said, I don’t regret stopping the w-“

“That is not what I meant.”

The interruption startled John and he hushed immediately, feeling a tug at his heart. His gaze remained on her face, on her onyx eyes, trying to figure her out. Trying to figure himself out. He should have known it wasn’t what she meant. He had known it wasn’t what she meant. The war was over. It was past them, thought it never really would be. A burden he had to live with. But not a sin he would atone for. There were way too many others.

“Tell me it pains you. Tell me it pains you to know he isn’t here anymore. With us. – James.”

His eyes closed, pained, and it was the only motion he was able to share. The only emotion he was able to share. The grip around his crutch tightened, his knuckles shining white under his skin.

He had never been able to describe the color of the ocean until he saw his eyes. A fire to warm left him cold, the color too much like his hair. Was it more possible to count the grains of sand on this beach or the numbers of his freckles? He couldn’t listen to the waves crashing against the ocean without remembering his voice.

This wasn’t pain anymore, it was agony. But in the end, it had been the best. For James.

“I wanted to say goodbye to him. Tell him I loved him as well. But he was gone. You came back and told me I would never be allowed to see him again. He was part of us. John, he was part of _us_!”

There was so much agony in her, too. So much pain and loss. A mirror to his own feelings she could show in a truth, while he hid them in his lies.

“I know.” His voice cracked. Eyes still closed he tried to hold back the tears. They slipped from under his lids nonetheless. It felt like his own body betrayed him. As if betrayal never stopped.

“You loved him. You loved him and you forced him away.” He nodded slowly, carefully. Finally looked at her again, just to see directly into her face. Her expressions were contorted, pained, tears shimmering in the edges of her eyes. But the heaviest part was her irritation, so uncontrollable and visible for everyone to see. “Why?”

It was a question that haunted him. Since the day he had left Savannah, he wondered if he had just walked away from the biggest mistake in his life. He probably had. Yet his pain didn’t justify the pain of another.

“I…,” he started, stopped and let his voice fade away. How could he look at her and tell her about all of his conflicted feelings? How could he try to justify his actions when there was no way to make things reasonable? Turning around, his crutch almost slipped away in the sand, before he faced the sea again. The thin line of the horizon. Where sky and ocean reached for each other, but never touched at all.

“I never wanted to be a pirate. All I wanted was a way out of misery. To see daylight, when all I ever knew was darkness. Captain Flint was the pitch-black night. But James. James was sunlight. Gentle. Loving. Caring. True.” He lifted his head, tried to see.

_“Can’t you see it?”_

_“In the darkness lies freedom!”_

_“When there is no daylight between you and I…”_

_“I’ll take my chances.”_

“I wasn’t the one to bring him back to the light.”


End file.
